Digital in Teaching and Learning Gaining ground Digital in Teaching and Learning Gaining ground Carla Aerts Cambridge University Press Carla Aerts Cambridge University Press

How it started Digital technologies took some time to be adopted in Education Publishers started by including CD-ROM with additional teacher or student resources with books CD-ROMs were often added for use with whiteboards in the classroom The teaching and learning resources were developed to assist teachers in bringing interactive demonstrations

How it is evolving More powerful computers, tablets and mobile phones enter the market This brings a whole new dimension to teaching and learning Teachers can rely on additional teacher support resources to bring lessons to the classroom Students can interact with digital learning content such as: animations, sound files and quizes, etc

Technology is becoming more important It took some time for the Education space to engage with technology and its benefits The past 3 years have seen huge growth in edTec or Education Technology start-up companies These start-ups aim to bring digital learning tools to support teaching and learning

A key trend amongst education publishing Publishers are developing Digital and Interactive textbooks They can include tools to ‘annotate’ or make notes on their books, bookmark pages, highlight content Interactive 'assets' can be included such as: simple images, interactive 3D simulations e.g. a science lab, quizzes, videos etc. More advanced versions of such textbooks allow teachers to share notes and messages with students within the textbook Some of them can be used on desktop, laptop and tablets

What does this mean to creating learning content? Digital content development requires different commissioning processes Technical and ‘user interface’ or screen design are needed The digital and print need to be thought about in parallel Print and digital content development has to happen in parallel by specialist teams Content on screen requires special development and formats e.g. image formats, sound file formats, ePub formats…

What benefits can it bring to teachers and students Difficult learning concepts can be supported by interactive, visual or audio materials Teachers can make use of interactive learning materials to support their teaching Students can interact with learning materials and test their knowledge as much as they need to Teachers can recommend additional practice using digital learning and practice resources

It takes getting used to Technology staff and support will b required to help schools use the digital products or resources Teachers will need to get some additional training to familiarise themselves with the learning materials and the technology to bring it into the classroom Students will probably find it easier to use the technology than most of their teachers, so teachers need to be very well prepared

Technology is starting to personalise learning New technologies are bringing new digital or ‘e-learning’ approaches They are called ‘Adaptive’ or ‘Personalised’ Learning They support different ‘learning paths’ for each student Teachers have to teach in a different way and become more of a mentor, using these technologies They are more used in Higher Education, but will come to schools too Content has to be developed in a different way to work

A good place to start To develop and realise your digital vision As you develop new print content, you could look at planning a digital textbook too These textbooks work best when they have an associated lesson plans, digital resources, quizzes and tools to support teachers and learners alike

A good place to start a discussion